Love's Never Too Late
by Citizen-of-Pompeii
Summary: On the way back to each other, Wyatt and Lucy run into an unexpected obstacle: Amy Preston. Amy is not too keen on letting Wyatt Logan get away with breaking her sister's heart, even if it seems like Lucy's giving it right back to him. (TFP)
1. Chapter 1

**Hi guys! I'm here with a fic for the TFP contest. I've never done this before, but I was looking through the prompts and inspiration struck, so here I am. I am still working on Living in the Present (I feel like I need a better title for that, but oh well) but I wanted to get this done before the first deadline, June 28** **th** **. Writing fics always takes longer than I think it will, so I've devoted my time to this. I just wanted to thank you guys for all the support that you've given me so far in my other fics. I adore this fandom and this show and I hope one day I'll be among the revered names of Timeless fanfic writes that stun us with their amazingness** **.**

 **I started writing two pages of this, realized it was way too dark (and had too much exposition) for what I wanted and moved it so I can make another fic out of it. I wanted this to be lighter. But still with angst. There's always some form of angst. So please enjoy some Lyatt healing and good, old Amy Preston.**

 **I have no beta, all mistakes are mine. I always get so excited to post after finished something that I miss dumb mistakes, don't be afraid to point them out to me so I can correct them.**

 **Please enjoy. Please leave a review at the end, it gives me life.**

* * *

Lucy has a problem.

Not a Rittenhouse sized problem, thank god. She can do without another one of those for the rest of her life.

It isn't a Garcia Flynn sized problem either. Not from when he hopped year to year trying to wipe out Rittenhouse. Not from when Lucy, Wyatt, and Rufus thought he was the biggest problem they'd have to face in relation to time travel.

It's an Amy Preston sized problem.

An Amy Preston sized problem stands in a category all on its own, gigantic and blaring and expelling shockwaves that shake the foundation Lucy Preston stands on. It isn't exactly what Lucy expected when she got Amy back. Don't get her wrong, she is thrilled to have her sister back. She tried clinging to Amy after getting her back, but Amy Preston doesn't really stay in one place for long. She zips around, only leaving blurry polaroid shots and displaced air where she had once been a second ago.

It actually took Lucy —analytical and fact driven as she was— a few days to realize there was a problem at all. She was too high on euphoria due to Amy's return and Rittenhouse's defeat. Nothing else seemed to matter at the moment.

Not even the broken heart she was still nursing; violate, yawning caverns in her heart eroded by Emma, her mother, the pieces of herself that she lost to Rittenhouse, and most of all, a certain blue-eyed soldier. Having the possibilities of a future with him snatched away—by Jessica's return, the bile-inducing pregnancy announcement, and then her subsequent betrayal—it tore Lucy apart more than anything. She'd lost her mother far before her death, something she only realized in hindsight. The past had already stolen so much from her. She wanted a future. Her future. _Their_ future. But the past decided to take that from her too.

She took Amy back from it, unraveling the tangled thread of whatever Emma and her mother did. She landed back in 2018 and Amy was there, flesh and blood and real and home. Lucy's ache for Wyatt still pulsed through her veins every day, but with Amy home, it was only a dull singing in her blood instead a sharp pang. She'd been living with it so long, it was barely noticeable.

To her.

Not to Amy.

Amy Preston knows Lucy Preston. Amy's seen Lucy filled to the brim with fury, choking back disappointment, beaming with pride, leaking tears of sorrow, staring into empty space with numbness, and yes, weighed down with heartbreak. Lucy is heartbroken now, unlike anything Amy's ever seen before, but it's still heartbreak. Figuring out the cause from there is not difficult.

It's one Master Sergeant Wyatt Logan, Delta Force.

Personally, Amy Preston doesn't give a damn about who he is. He broke her sister's heart. No way she's letting him get away with it.

* * *

Lucy and Wyatt's road back to each other is anything but smooth, and they are walking it, not driving it. But they are on it.

After they fractured apart, hitting rock bottom with all the force of an asteroid, Lucy needed time. She traveled through time, yet never ever managed to have enough of it. Not where it counted.

His confession weighed on her everyday: _I love you, Lucy._ Words that reached her ears on airwaves of grief, loss, and mourning. Words said because Rufus wanted Wyatt to, and now he's gone. In some small way, those words were an atonement.

Defeating Rittenhouse and saving Rufus; those were the two things her world narrowed down to. Luckily, the future versions of themselves crashed into her present to help with one of them. They left as soon as they saved Rufus, not wanting to reveal too much about the future because then it could impact the present and therefore change the future. Although it was already going to change because Rufus will have never died… just trying to work out the diverging and splitting timelines gave Lucy a massive headache.

With Rufus back, an integral part of who she is now, Lucy started healing bit by bit. She still wasn't in a good place by any means, but it was a better place. It was progress. The team was back, glued together through the return of their pilot.

But her and Wyatt… it was so damn hard, and she was so tired. So very tired. Her faith in him, to protect her, never once faltered. But in the bunker, away from the mission, meeting his eyes only resulted in flashes of pain, longing, and guilt. They were both so hesitant to touch, to tease each other, to say anything weighty that might cause the other pain. The cliffs at the ends of the chasm between them crumbled more and more every day as the distance grew.

It was complete and utter torture. Her and Wyatt were always tactile; the brush of hands, the electrifying eye contact that tethered them together, the weight of Wyatt's hand on the small of her back, the bumping of shoulders, the linking of arms, the smoothing of a lapel.

Rufus made it better. He helped them smile together, laugh together. He reminded them of Lucy and Wyatt, the duo that barreled through history together, bumbling and tripping, but always catching each other.

It wasn't always a full catch, where she tumbled neatly into his arms. Sometimes, it was all they could do to grip a forearm for dear life to keep the other from falling. But they never let each other go.

Bit by bit, piece by piece, slowly… they worked their way back.

Lucy was tired. She was tired of pain and loss and denial. It hurts right now, the cracks in her heart still throbbing and fresh as the day they'd been inflicted. It isn't magically going to disappear, the pain. So she is going to let the man who put them there work on patching them back up. Ironic, how only he can fix what he broke.

Besides, Lucy has to accept the irrevocable truth.

She is in love with Wyatt Logan.

She never once stopped loving him. No when her heart shattered into a thousand pieces like Cinderella's slipper when it met unforgiving tile. Not when the words, _I love you, too,_ snagged on her ribcage and refused to make their way to her vocal chords. Not when his elbow collided with her face by accident, because _I'm not gonna let you get hurt._ Not when the thought of Wyatt fathering a baby with Jessica tugged at the void in Lucy's chest for a future she'd never have.

Lucy decided she is tired of pushing Wyatt away. She's not going to do it anymore. She knows they still have a long way to go, a long road back.

But they're Lucy and Wyatt. Whatever's waiting at the end, she has no doubt it will be worth it.

* * *

Adjusting is hard.

Not just to a world where her mother passed due to cancer and Amy flounces around the house with all the energy of a toddler on a sugar high.

The history is different. She can't go back to teaching right away because her facts aren't accurate anymore. Not just the events she traveled to, like the Hindenburg or Abraham Lincoln's death or the Salem Witch trials. The damn butterfly effect ripples through history, warping the little facts along with everything else. It's relearning everything she already knew. Very frustrating.

Agent Christopher is very sympathetic, offering support and pensions for services rendered to Homeland Security (aka time travel) until Lucy can get her feet back under her for normal, civilian life.

One thing she knows for certain is that she's not going back to Stanford. Not to the department her mother built, the same one that denied her tenure. Nope. She stills wants to teach, enjoys bringing history to life and connecting with the students, she just can't do it there.

She spends most of her days trying to flush out the old history to replace with the new. She doesn't completely forget about _her_ history, she records it in a notebook for safekeeping. Maybe it's a ridiculous notion, it's history that no longer exists and they can't go back and restore it to the way it was. But preserving history is what she does, so she slaves over that notebook.

Amy still has her podcast, and Lucy studying history every day like she doesn't already know it throws Amy for more than one loop. Amy's nose scrunches in confusion every time she sees it, but she doesn't comment. Lucy's life has been weird ever since some random Homeland Security Agent turned up at thier door.

Wyatt's back at Pendleton, waiting for an assignment. However, his primary job these days seems to be helping Lucy in her endeavor to devour an entirely different history. He totes stacks of library books into her house upon request, brings home cooked meals (he avoids takeout when he can, says she has enough of that as it is), returns the books, throws in little details about the original history that escaped Lucy's mind during the chaos of a mission.

It's comfortable, it's time spent together. It's them inching ever closer to each other.

* * *

It's a Tuesday night, Lucy bent over a notebook and scribbling about the forgotten, heroic Alice Paul, when the doorbell rings.

 _Wyatt._

Lucy's not sure what he's bringing tonight, but when she told him she was going to be going through Grace Humiston and the feminist movement under her leadership, he vowed to be there as soon as he could. He knows the ache that strikes Lucy when she reads Grace's name in place of Alice's.

A woman history forgot. Just like her sister not that long ago.

This time if Wyatt tries to rub her arms and whisper _you're not the only one,_ she'll let him. No more running.

Lucy looks up from her work when the doorbell rings. "I'll get it!" Amy crows, bouncing up from her spot lounging on the couch and watching soap operas.

 _Oh no._

Lucy wants to bolt from the couch, get to the front door first and let Wyatt in. Instead, she decides to give Amy the benefit of the doubt.

Lucy hadn't noticed it at first, but whenever she mentions Wyatt's name, something swims across Amy's eyes. White hot flames of contained rage. Lucy is very familiar with the hellfire Amy can rain down upon people, having seen it firsthand. The thought of that directed at Wyatt is very disconcerting to this day.

The first time he came over, the first time since Lucy got Amy back, Lucy was convinced she might have to restrain her little sister. First, came the shock. Amy's face slack and mouth open like one of the cartoons where they have to physically pull their jaw off the floor. Then the boiling anger. Glaring and making every effort to make Wyatt uncomfortable and not feel at home.

To say Lucy was appalled with Amy's behavior was an understatement. Suffice it to say, there was arguing that night. Much to Lucy's frustration, she never got a straightforward answer on Amy's attitude. Anytime she asked, Amy just kept repeatedly slinging, "like you don't know", "really, Lucy?", "I thought you were smarter than this", and other variations of those statements at her.

Ever since then, Wyatt's been a point of contention between them, but Lucy still can't manage to pry an answer from Amy's lips. If Amy was a secret agent, Lucy doesn't think she'd ever crack under interrogation.

Amy acts as if Lucy should already know the answer to all the questions she's asking. Which is fair, if she didn't lose any time with Amy due to time travel and her blinking temporarily out of existence. Not that she can say any of that.

Lucy worries her bottom lip as she strains to hear what's happening at the door. She shuffles across the couch, to the end closest to the open door.

One beat. Two beats. Three beats.

Okay, Amy should have opened the door by now. Lucy's brow furrows as she hears clanking. Is that coming from the kitchen? What? Lucy's concern meter climbs higher as the sounds of cabinets closing floats over to her.

Benefit of the doubt, benefit of the doubt, Lucy repeats in her head.

Finally, _finally,_ Lucy hears soft footfalls in the foyer and the slight creaking of hinges as the front door is opened. Lucy waits with bated breath, hoping that Amy will be mature, not let her anger get the better of her, and let Wyatt into the house.

No such luck. Hushed voices glide into the house, the slamming of a door resounding soon after. Lucy sighs, rubbing her hand across her forehead.

Amy skips back into the room and flops down next to Lucy, not caring that she is occupying Amy's former seat. Amy sinks down into the seat, propping her feet back up on the coffee table, and ignores Lucy's piercing stare. "So…?" Lucy asks. Amy doesn't even glance over. "Who was at the door?"

"A door-to-door salesman. Told him we're not interested." Amy replies, eyes on the drama unfolding on the television screen. Lucy's patience has worn paper-thin. Even less. More like tissue paper.

Now Amy's outright lying to her.

She snatches the remote from next to Amy's feet and pauses the soap. "Hey!" Amy exclaims, putting her feet back on the ground and making a grab for the remote.

"Come on, Amy!" Lucy exclaims, holding the remote out of reach.

"What?" Amy feigns ignorance.

"A door-to-door salesman? I know it's Wyatt out there." Lucy huffs.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Amy leans back, folding her arms over her chest angrily. Lucy gives up. Amy's not going to budge.

Lucy tosses the remote into Amy's lap before springing up and storming to the door. She throws it open to see Wyatt still standing there, holding a pie in his hands with wide eyes. "I am so sorry about her." Lucy profusely apologizes. "Come on i…." Lucy trails off as she looks down at Wyatt's feet.

Liquid. Thick and yellow and reflecting light.

 _Olive oil?_

"I think your sister really wanted me to fall on my ass." Wyatt admits sheepishly with a shrug. He's stuck there, surrounded by slick oil spread just enough so that he can't just step over it. Lucy can feel her face reddening with shame and anger. "Lucy—" Wyatt starts.

"Amy!" Lucy screams back into the house. Lucy waits to hear Amy's feet skidding on the floor in a dash to reach the front door. They don't come. "Amy!" Lucy calls again. Amy still doesn't appear. Lucy will deal with her sister later.

Lucy gives Wyatt a small, nervous smile. "I am so sorry, again." Lucy says. "I'll back. Just… don't move."

"No danger of that happening, ma'am." Wyatt replies with a light chuckle. Now she's flushed for an entirely different reason. Ducking her head, she rushes back into the house and grabs a roll of paper towels. When she arrives back at the door, she rips off a wad and places it on the oil directly in front of the door. The oil absorbs immediately. Lucy puts a few more layers down.

"Okay," she straightens up. "I think that's good. Just step on that to come in and you should be good." As Wyatt places his foot down, Lucy puts her hands out to help him if he slips. It's far more likely that she'll just end up falling into the oily mess with him, her clumsiness as strong as ever. But as long as she's with him, she doesn't mind.

Luckily, Wyatt makes it safely into her foyer, standing a hairsbreadth away from Lucy who barely moved from her position to catch him. The air is charged between them as brown locks with blue. His breath fans over her face, skimming along the planes of her cheeks and sending a shiver down her spine. Her eyelashes flutter at the heady close proximity. After so much distance for so long, the nearness is dizzying and muddles her brain. She opens her mouth to say something, what she's not sure, when the moment is interrupted.

"Oh, cut it out already!" Amy grunts in their direction, standing some ways behind them. Lucy whirls around and hurls the roll of paper towels at her. They hit her crossed arms and bounce to the ground.

"You're cleaning that mess up." Lucy orders. Amy simply scoffs and rolls her eyes. "And you don't get any pie." Lucy ushers Wyatt past Amy and into the kitchen.

"Good, I didn't want any anyway!" Amy calls after them.

* * *

Three days later, Wyatt is back at the Preston house, thigh touching Lucy's as she flips through another history book about how Grace changed the feminist movement that Lucy once knew. Butterfly effect, yet again. She's a little slower than usual today as she scans the page, half of her laser focus dedicated solely to the physical contact between her and Wyatt.

After the incident in her foyer, some invisible wall between them crumbled to the ground in a spectacle of mortar, brick, and cement. It's almost like they both realized how much they've missed simply being _near_ to each other and are unwilling to go back to the way it was before.

Lucy guesses maybe she should thank Amy for trying to make Wyatt fall on his ass via olive oil.

Maybe after Amy's done with her childish tirade towards Wyatt.

Wyatt observes Lucy's reduced reading speed. "So, professor, feeling tired today?" he asks, trying to smother a smirk.

"What?" Lucy replies. She knows she's been caught. Keeping her focus on the book in front of her, she tries to seem disinterested and ignorant of Wyatt's inquiry. But she spies that damn attractive smirk out of her peripheral.

"I swear you've been on this page for twenty minutes now." Wyatt jabs playfully.

Lucy turns to him, mouth dropping open in mock shock and offense. "Twenty minutes? Wow, you think highly of yourself, now don't you?" Mirth leaks into Lucy's voice. Wyatt's smirk expands and his eyes twinkle with mischief.

Lucy loves seeing him like this; his face devoid of the usual anguish he stores there, a mere fraction of the guilt he dams up inside himself. He looks carefree, troublesome… happy.

"So… are you saying I'm the distraction, professor?" Wyatt questions, raising his eyebrows and pressing his thigh more firmly against hers. More contact. More Wyatt. It takes Lucy a few minutes to snap out of it and replay her own words through her head.

 _Damn it,_ she flat out confessed that she was distracted because of him.

A snappy comeback is failing her at the moment, but she's not letting him win. "Well—" she starts, before choking off.

Wyatt's winning.

He's taken his hand, and settled in on her thigh, the one where they're connected. The unexpected hand steals her voice and coherence. It starts moving gently up and down, a soothing innocent motion confined to a tiny area.

He's still playing it safe after all this time, after the leaps and bounds of progress they've been making toward each other.

Lucy's done with safe. She wants to let go of the safety bar, unbuckle the seat belt. She's ready to throw herself over the cliff that is Wyatt Logan, to let herself drown in those blue, blue eyes and lock herself in those strong, comforting arms forever.

The faded scars on her heart protest, but Lucy doesn't listen. She trusts Wyatt. As teammates, as friends, and now as… something more. Her possibility. At this point, he's more like her certainty. At the end of the day, he's there. Whether it's to argue about fate versus free willor assure he that she's nothing like her biological father or hold her when she breaks after six weeks with Rittenhouse or bring the steps to the bottom of the Lifeboat, ready to spring up when he sees that she's hurt. No matter what, his heart was always hers. Even when she thought it belonged to Jessica.

Now, without any resurrected, sleeper-agent wife wedged between them, their hearts simply belong to each other.

Lucy's hand falls on top of his, her eyes searching his. There's a whirlwind of emotion. The mischief from before is a distant, forgotten gleam as desire for her wars with his fear that she's not ready yet, that she'll push him away and ask for space.

That's not happening.

Her other hand reaches up, feathering a path from his hairline down his cheek and neck to his shoulder. A phantom path, a pale imitation of the caress from the morning of 1941. Wyatt's eyes darken further and flicker at her touch.

She's ready. For him, for this, for them to come together again. For this time to be the beginning of the rest of their lives. Because she knows that she wants to spend the rest of her life with him. There's no one else.

Lucy's eyes volley between those entrapping blue eyes and plush lips that she hasn't kissed in far too long. This close, Lucy detects the hitch in Wyatt's breath as she sees the clear intent on Lucy's face. She's leaning in, closer and closer and closer, her hand retracing its path back up to cup Wyatt's cheek.

He's tense, unmoving as he waits for her to bring them together, giving her complete control to back out if she wants to.

Just another reason for her to love Wyatt Logan.

Her eyes are just drifting shut, their lips barely skimming when Amy's loud voice booms in the room. Lucy's eyes fly open in shock and she pulls back to look at her sister.

Amy's standing in front of the coffee table holding two mugs with the most forced smile plastered on her lips. Lucy guesses she shouldn't be surprised that Amy would chose this exact time to interrupt them. God forbid Lucy Preston gets to kiss Wyatt Logan. It was hard enough to do the first time around; with Jiya barging in on them and then Wendall Scott popping the trunk open right before she could reacquaint her lips with Wyatt's.

Lucy had been too focused on Wyatt and kissing him to hear what Amy said when she trampled into the room. Now Amy's just standing there, her eyes flinty as they examine the closeness of Lucy and Wyatt. Lucy can feel Wyatt shifting infinitesimally and then start to inch away from her. With all the speed of a striking viper, Lucy wraps her hand around Wyatt's and tugs him back toward her. "Did you need something, Amy?" Lucy doesn't even attempt to clear the irritation from her voice.

"Yeah, _Lucy,_ " Amy bites out, that fake smile still partially in place. It looks painful. "just thought I'd bring you guys some coffee since you've been here a while." She bends down and thuds the mugs on the table. Lucy is surprised when she doesn't see any cracks in the exterior.

Amy is still standing there, trying to kill Wyatt through her eyes when Lucy looks up. "Anything else?" she snips.

"Nope," Amy pops the _p._ "nothing. Enjoy your coffee." Then she's stomping out of the room, the coffee mugs rattling at her exit.

Lucy sighs, the moment gone. Stolen by her own sister. Every time she dreamed about getting Amy back, this scenario never came up.

When she looks back to Wyatt, he's eyeing the coffee with suspicion. "Do you think she poisoned it?" his voice is all seriousness.

Lucy wants to melt into the ground right about now.

"I really wish I could say no." Lucy sighs. She snatches both their mugs. "I don't trust either of these."

Down the drain they go.

* * *

Lucy has had enough.

Olive oil. The probably poisoned coffee (she could find no evidence or proof but she's sure there was _something_ in that mug). Amy slashed his tires for god's sake.

And no, Lucy does not care that Amy was inspired by Carrie Underwood's song.

Luckily for her, Wyatt took it all in stride. He never got angry.

Lucy, on the other hand, did.

Embarrassment and anger were two emotions becoming far too familiar to her in association with Amy. Apologies rolled off Lucy's tongue as commonly as greetings. She begged Wyatt to let her pay for new tires, but he declined.

He ordered some new ones and called a cab to take him home. Lucy would have offered him a spare room is she didn't think that Amy might try to off him in his sleep.

Not that she would be able to. He's Delta Force. But Amy's a whole different kind of force and Lucy does not want to see what happens when one goes up against the other.

The final straw comes through a phone call from a boxing gym and fitness center.

Lucy needs a glass of wine after that.

Amy isn't home when Lucy receives the call. Lucy lounges on the couch with her wine glass as she waits not-so-patiently for her little sister to walk through the door.

Whatever her issue with Wyatt Logan, it's ending tonight.

Eventually, long after Lucy's drank all the wine in the glass, the opening of a door announces Amy's arrival. "Amy," Lucy calls, not deigning to get up. "can you come in here, please?" She'll ask nicely the first time. She really hopes that it won't come to that, but this needs to stop.

"Yeah?" Amy replies, strutting into the living room and dropping her duffel bag at her feet. She's wearing tight athletic leggings and tank top with sweat stains still drying. Her hair is up in a ponytail, a few strands sticking to her skin.

"Intense workout at the gym?" Lucy questions, twisting the stem of her wine glass back and forth in her hand.

"Yeah." Amy looks at Lucy warily.

"That's funny, cause guess who called me tonight?" Lucy looks up, awaiting Amy's guess. Amy merely shrugs, eyeing the empty wine glass catching the light. "The owner of the gym you were just at. Roger," Lucy snaps with the hand not holding the glass. "that's his name. He told me some interesting things."

"Really?" Amy finally looks a little nervous, swallowing as she sensed what was coming next.

"Yeah." Lucy deadpans. "Something about you going into the ring with someone about four times a week and beating the shit out of him. In fact, people have had to pull you off of him. And guess how he describe the guy?" Amy remains silent. "Guess."

"Dark hair, blue eyes, scruff? Name's Wyatt Logan?" Amy answers dryly.

Lucy huffs out an incredulous laugh. She extricates herself from the embrace of the couch, leaning forward to set her wine glass on the coffee table. "Wyatt Logan." Lucy confirms.

"I don't want to fight about him, tonight." Amy says tiredly.

"Then don't. We'll talk like mature adults. Sit." Lucy pats the space on the couch next to her. Amy rolls her head back on her neck, releasing a long sigh. She brought it upon herself. After a minute, she falls into the cushions. "Okay," Lucy wastes no time now that Amy's actually sitting next to her, listening. "obviously you have a problem with Wyatt—"

"Thank you, Captain Obvious." Amy snorts.

Lucy glares at her before continuing. "I just want to know why."

"Seriously, Lucy?" Amy pushes herself up from her position and rearranges herself closer to Lucy. "That jerkwad broke your heart. And for some reason—"

"What a minute. What?" Lucy hasn't divulged anything about her and Wyatt to Amy since she got back. How would she begin to explain the dead, not-dead wife situation?

"You think I didn't know? Or couldn't tell? Come on, Lucy. I know you. And I know he broke your heart. He's not allowed to just get away with that." Amy insists, righteous, protective maelstroms whirling in her eyes.

"That's—it's—" Lucy flounders for a response. "That's not a valid excuse for everything you've done to him!" she exclaims. Amy scoffs, rolling her eyes as she slouches back into the cushions. "You tried to kill him nine times!"

Amy shot back into a sitting position. "Yes, I restrained myself nine times. You should be proud!" It was Lucy's turn to roll her eyes. "Besides, if you're counting beating his soldier ass at the gym, which you obviously are, that brings the number above nine. Anyway, stop being so dramatic. I hardly tried to kill him—"

"He could have broken his neck slipping in that olive oil." Lucy points out.

"He's damn Delta Force. If he dies because of some olive oil, the U.S. Army needs to reevaluate their recruits." Amy shoots back. "And ipecac syrup is hardly deadly—"

"That's what you put in the coffee?" Lucy shrieks, appalled.

"Oh, come on. It's not that bad. He spends a little time on his knees puking his guts out. Big deal."

"Yes, Amy, it is a big deal. A very big deal."

"Really? I mean, if it bothered him, wouldn't he hit back?"

"What?" Lucy can't draw a proper breath.

"He doesn't seem to be trying that hard to be _staying alive,_ as you so dramatically put it. Every time we get in the ring, he refuses to hit me. It's like he steps in just to be beat up. Just so you know, I at least tried to avoid his pretty face for your benefit." Amy announces.

"You did that so you wouldn't get caught." Lucy contradicts, her mind still stuck on a stoic Wyatt letting Amy beat him up. Now she needs to have a separate conversation with him.

"Guilty." Amy shrugs. Oh, she's guilty of plenty. Lucy's stare conveys her opinion. "Look, Lucy, yes I did all that stuff, okay? But I wasn't going to let him get away with breaking your heart. Especially since you seem to be giving him the go-ahead to do it again. I really thought you were smarter than to give your heart to someone who already broke it once before." Lucy's eyes well. Amy was, in a twisted, backwater way, kind of trying to stick up for her. It's such an Amy thing to do, Lucy doesn't know how she missed it all this time.

"Amy," Lucy says gently. She takes Amy's hand and pulls her up to look in her eyes. She needs Amy to understand this. "I love him." Amy shakes her head in disbelief. "And I _know_ that he loves me."

"Yeah, loves you so much that he took your heart and shattered it."

"Amy… the situation we were put in… it was impossible. I literally _can't_ explain it to you. But he was put in an impossible situation." Lucy repeats. "And it wasn't just him. I made choices too, I pushed him away. We both tried to what we thought was the 'right' thing to do. In reality, we just made ourselves miserable. We hit rock bottom, Amy. No where to go but up, right?" Amy still doesn't look quite convinced. She gently pulls one her hands from Lucy's and reaches up to brush a tear away from the older Preston's face. Lucy didn't even realize she started crying. "We've been working our way back to each other and Amy… I'm so tired. I am tired of the pain and the denial and staying away. I love him. I am so sick of it. I just want to be with him, and I want to be happy. We both deserve it, after everything. It wasn't easy, I promise, and if you want him to suffer, I can guarantee that he did. But I want the suffering to end, please. Please, Amy, don't make him suffer anymore." Lucy begs, the tears falling in earnest.

"You really love him?" Amy asks, voice small. Lucy nods forcefully.

Amy wraps Lucy up in her arms, her grip unyielding. Small shakes rack Amy's body and seconds later, Lucy feels the wet droplets of tears on her shoulder. "Then who am I to stand in the way of love?"

* * *

Lucy really should not be surprised when Wyatt throws the front door open, barreling into her house with wide eyes and coiled muscles. After her heart-to-heart with Amy, Lucy texted Wyatt asking him to come over immediately. He'd sent a few inquiry messages after that, but Lucy didn't reply, worried that she'd start spilling everything over text instead of face-to-face.

Right about now, that choice appears to be shortsighted. Wyatt skipped simple worry and concern and went right to Protect Lucy From Imminent Danger mode. "Whoa, man, she's perfectly fine." Lucy hears Amy assure from the foyer. "She's just in the living ro—"

The thumping sound of Wyatt's footsteps drown out Amy's voice as he charges into the room. "Lucy?" he asks a split second before his eyes land on her. Relief loosens his muscles, ready to pounce on the first threat he saw. He rushes over to her, sitting on the couch. He skids to stop, positioning his arms to draw her into a hug before he thinks better of it and his arms hang limply in the empty air.

Lucy doesn't hesitate. She launches herself into his arms, giving him the physical confirmation that she's okay. He responds right away, wrapping her up tightly, holding her against him and breathing him her scent. "It's okay. I'm okay." Lucy murmurs into his skin.

She can't tell how long they stay there, content in each other's arms. Not nearly long enough, but she has a few questions to ask and a few things to say.

With reluctance, she's the one pulling away first. Not far. Just enough to sit back down and tug him down beside her. "Why did you let her do it?" Lucy asks.

Wyatt's eyes, which had just been drinking in Lucy's face, color with shock. "Um… what? I think I need a bit more context here, Lucy." He says, with a chuckle and furrowed brow.

"Amy." Lucy clarifies. "Why did you let her beat her up? She said you didn't defend yourself."

Wyatt looks down, clarity hitting him with all the subtlety of a spiked wrecking ball.

"Wyatt?" Lucy implores softly.

"I already hit one Preston sister, figured that was enough." He whispers it so softly that Lucy almost misses it.

Almost.

God this man. This man that takes all the blame onto himself. The man that just won't forgive himself. Not even for an accident. Not even after she'd already forgiven him a thousand lifetimes ago. Atlas, holding up the weight of the heavens, he has nothing on Wyatt Logan.

"I love you." Lucy confesses, overflowing with so much affection and love for him. Wyatt's head snaps up, equal part hopeful and skeptical. Of course.

Lucy takes his head in her hands, just like in the Alamo when she yanked him back from his self-sacrificing abyss, "I. Love. You." She enunciates every word clearly, leaving no room for doubt. "I love you so much. I have for a long time. I just… I couldn't say it earlier—"

Wyatt shakes his head between her pale fingers, tears falling down his face. "It's okay." He croaks.

Lucy gives a waterlogged laugh, following his teary example. "I love the stupid, reckless man who let my little sister beat the shit out of him because he still hasn't forgiven himself for an _accident_ that I forgave him for so, so long ago. I guess we'll have to work on you forgiving yourself, won't we?" Lucy asks him, beaming from ear to ear.

Wyatt nods. "Yeah." He agrees.

"I love you, Wyatt Logan."

"I love you, Lucy Preston." He's smiling now, too. With red eyes and tears still falling and a blinding smile, he's never looked so handsome.

So Lucy kisses him.

It's everything. They're both crying, and their salty tears penetrate the kiss but neither care. They're crying and smiling and laughing but it's the best kiss Lucy's ever had.

Their lips meeting again is lightning bolts and buzzing electricity and forest fires and avalanches and earthquakes. It's everything. How did she go so long without kissing him? His hand i twined in her hair, the other resting on her hip. Hers are still cupped around his face. She wraps them around his shoulders and hauls herself ever closer to him.

He topples over with the sudden shift of weight, his back meeting the couch with Lucy on top of him. There's no place in the world he'd rather be.

Lucy giggles, breaking their kiss to laugh into his shoulder. It's contagious, hearing the precious sound of her laughter and he finds himself laughing too. "God, I love you." Wyatt says it again, his arms wrapped around her. He plans on saying it so much she gets sick of it.

"Shut up and kiss me." Lucy chastises, her lips crashing into him one second later. Heat zings all throughout his body, flaring up and up as Lucy rearranges herself above him so that she's straddling him. Wyatt wastes no time in pressing Lucy flush against him. He groans.

He plans to spend the rest of his life loving Lucy Preston. He's planned that from the first moment he confessed he loved her, but now she has said it back. Now he can _really_ show her how he feels.

That he loves her.

Starting tonight.

* * *

 **Yay! All done. At almost one in the morning. And I have practice all day tomorrow. Oh well.**

 **It definitely took longer than I thought, but I should have expected that. My sister graduated (I'm the last one left) and me and my family just got back from a week-long vacation. I didn't get to write on the road as much as I thought I would, but it's all done now.**

 **Anyway, I hope that you guys all enjoyed it, please leave me a review and tell me what you think! And can anybody tell me why NBC hasn't renewed Timeless yet? Are they trying to kill us?**


	2. Chapter 2

**I was 100% planning on this being a one-shot, but then some people did what I asked them to and reviewed.**

 **Sarrabr4 said she hoped it wasn't a one-shot and chasidy warner had an idea for another chapter and then an epilogue. Suffice it to say, it was a very good idea and suddenly here I am with another chapter because inspiration has struck. Thank you, chasidy warner and Sarrabr4.**

 **I am finishing this up first because multichapter fics for the TFP contest need to be finished by the deadline. And yet again, writing chapters always take longer than I think they will.**

 **I also wanted to thank everyone who favorited, followed, and reviewed. Getting a response for my writing is just so amazing and I love it. Thanks, Gracielinn for the good luck! Di92, thank you so much for your review, it really made my day. Might have almost made me cry (from happiness and appreciation). TheVelvetDusk and angellwings, thanks so much for your reviews as well, they also made my day! And their entries in the TFP are amazing as well, so if you haven't already, you should go check them out.**

 **Everyone else who reviewed, thank you guys so, so much! I really appreciate it. I would list more people, but it's 2:00 am now and I want to get this posted so I can sleep. I have my first day of work tomorrow. Joy.**

 **I forgot to mention it before, but the title comes from the song, "Let me go" by Avril Lavigne ft. Chad Kroeger. It's a great song and I suggest giving it a listen.**

 **All in all, here's another chapter. I hope you enjoy.**

* * *

Lucy Preston considered a lot of possibilities when it came to getting her beloved sister back, good and bad.

The most desirable— and most delusional — outcome involved picking up right where they left off, that night when Lucy left with a Homeland security agent, unknowing that she'd be in 1937 a few hours later. Like hitting pause and then play. Like putting a bookmark, leaving the book alone for a while, and then coming back to the same page, paragraph, and sentence a while later.

The worst one would be coming back to a timeline where Amy was Rittenhouse, twisted and warped by their mother. A partial princess (Henry Wallace wasn't Rittenhouse as far as Lucy knew). A world where Lucy and Amy would be on opposite sides of the same war. Amy was strong, determined, smart, and had a black belt in karate. Rittenhouse might even have sent her on their missions back in time. Lucy knew she'd never be able to let any harm come to Amy. Even if she was decimating history, blowing up their present with the shockwaves her destruction caused. Even if it was just an imposter wearing her sister's face. Or maybe Lucy would. Maybe she'd let Amy get hurt and just become more and more unrecognizable to herself. All in all, Lucy liked neither of those options.

She considered everything in between those two extremes. Where Lucy and Amy's role had basically been switched and she would come home to her sister teaching history like Lucy used to. Where Amy was practically the same, Lucy simply had a gap in her memory from missed time and would need to fake her way through any mentions of these forgotten times.

Out of all her pondering, she never considered the situation she actually came home to.

Amy Preston.

Spitfire. Strong. Smart. Funny. A degree in sociology. A black belt in karate. A podcast. Still having no concrete direction for her future, no plan or carved path. Still living life to its fullest, as only she knew how.

There was only one difference in this Amy.

Her detestation for Wyatt Logan.

When Lucy lost Amy, she had never met Wyatt.

The Amy she came back to, oh did she know Wyatt. And hated him. She beat him up at the gym sparring. She slashed his tires. She put ipecac syrup in his coffee. She even spilled olive oil all around him in an attempt that he'd try to get out of it and slip, falling on his ass. All in the name of getting revenge for breaking Lucy's heart.

It was only later, after a jarring phone call and a naked conversation that Amy swore off trying to kill Wyatt—which she denied doing in the first place, saying Lucy was blowing things out of proportion.

That same night, Lucy confessed her love for her solider, ending her night in the best possible way: in his arms.

It's not to say that it was smooth sailing from there on out, seas were still choppy with no land in sight. But Lucy had gone this far without abandoning ship. She wasn't going to jump overboard now.

Wyatt was still cautious around Amy, stilted and polite as if she were a stranger. Lucy would still catch her sister sending Wyatt the occasional glare.

Lucy knew Amy was trying, and she appreciated it.

A few night ago, with her and Wyatt cuddled on the couch after a long night of scouring history books for changes to the timeline, Amy brought them both coffee.

Wyatt drank it.

And didn't turn out upending his guts to the toilet a little while later.

Progress.

* * *

Wyatt is nervous.

The jittering like you're on a caffeine high nervous. The uncontrollable shaky nervous.

Its been a few months since Lucy declared her love for him. Since Lucy found her way back into his arms. Since Wyatt's world was whole and right again.

The day after, waking up with Lucy snuggled into his arms on her narrow, mildly uncomfortable-to-sleep-on couch, Wyatt thought he was hallucinating. It was all his hopes, dreams, deepest wishes, and strongest desires wrapped in ivory skin with raven curls and gorgeous, deep dark eyes.

After screwing things up with her so badly the first time, Wyatt was terrified.

What if one day he made a small mistake, but it all came crashing back for Lucy? What if she remembered how badly he hurt her? How much he fractured her heart? Again and again? And decided that heartbreak is all he would bring her?

Wyatt was very aware that he did not deserve Lucy Preston. He wasn't in any realm _near_ worthy of her. What if she woke up one day and realized that too? What if she got up and just left?

She'd saved Wyatt's life in every way and now he wasn't sure he could live without her. She was necessary to his existence. Like one day he'd stopped breathing oxygen because all he needed for his heart to beat was her.

His endless, whirling fears cumulated into chains, strapping down his affection and capping his physicality with the woman he loved. He felt like his every action was enclosed with neon caution signs. Wyatt let Lucy initiate all touch and even then his touch was hesitant, like she'd pull away any second. He'd say something carelessly affectionate in the moment before coming to his senses and choking on it, mulling over it for hours afterword, wondering if Lucy wanted to hear that, was ready to hear that.

Luckily for him, Lucy Preston was basically a goddamn saint. She didn't hold back and declared that she wouldn't let him either. Lucy constantly reminded him of their conversation when she told him, _we'll have to work on you forgiving yourself, won't we?_ His wonderful, amazing historian started a new notebook, labeling it _Things Wyatt Needs to Improve at._ She put forgiving himself at the top of the list. _Not hesitating to kiss me_ , became her second bullet point.

God, he loved this woman.

She was wrong when she said that him getting a second chance with Jessica was the closest thing she'd seen to a miracle.

Lucy was the miracle. His miracle.

Lucy and Wyatt kept traveling that road back to each other. He didn't care how long it was, as long as she was at the end of it.

Amy and Wyatt were a different story.

Wyatt forgiving himself wasn't the issue with the younger Preston. It was her forgiving him. Not that he blamed her. After all, he never did forgive Garcia Flynn for all he did to Lucy. Using her as a human shield, kidnapping her, pointing a gun at her.

What Wyatt did was just as bad, maybe worse. His brand of carnage didn't show on the outside. It manifested in the open wounds he inflicted on her heart. So, no, he couldn't blame Amy at all.

Lucy told him that she talked to Amy, but Wyatt watched as Amy still grappled with the concept of being kind to the bastard that broke her sister's heart. With the man that Lucy gave her heart back to. The man who could inflict that hurt all over again.

But he'll give Amy Preston the credit, she was trying. At the gym, they'd get into the ring to spar but if Wyatt didn't do any actual sparring or try defending himself, letting Amy lay it on him like he used to, she'd leave the ring. She didn't go near his car after slashing his tires, even gave him a small wad of cash to pay for the new ones. She made him coffee without any special throw-up serum mixed around in it. She only used olive oil for cooking. She didn't slam the door in his face, exchanged pleasantries.

But over the course of the few months where he and Lucy were piecing their relationship back together, Amy softened.

She glared at him less when she thought he wasn't looking. She greeted him without the slightest hint of resentment in her voice. She gave him a gift suggestion for Lucy's birthday.

One day, she called Wyatt out of the blue and asked him to meet her at the Preston residence. Once he got there, she said that they should clear the air for Lucy's sake. Wyatt was more than happy to comply. Amy laid it out: she could tell Wyatt loved her sister and vice versa, and Amy only wanted Lucy to be happy. Amy said that she approved of how happy Wyatt was making Lucy, but if he dared to break her heart again, there was no place on Earth or anywhere where Amy wouldn't find him. Wyatt didn't doubt her. If he ever broke Lucy's heart again, he'd willingly throw himself at Amy's mercy. Amy also decided to throw in that she would catch him sending anguished looks at Lucy and figured that Wyatt didn't need Amy adding to his particular brand of patheticness.

Wyatt took the olive branch, as barbed and heavy as it was.

It was all worth it for the face that Lucy made when Amy sat in the living room with both him and Lucy and started needling Wyatt good naturedly. Almost brotherly.

She lit up, her smile wide, genuine and all the sustenance Wyatt needed to survive. When Amy left the room, Lucy tackled him in one of her bear hugs.

Wyatt is proud of the progress that he's made this past couple of months, with both Preston sisters. Which leads him to where he is now, lingering on the walkway of the Preston household in front of the front door. Lucy isn't home. She's been back at Stanford for about three weeks. Wyatt doesn't completely understand why she'd go back to the college where the ghost of her mother is so prominent, but if it's what she wants, he won't question it. He's not being selfish and putting himself above her again. Ever.

He's been standing here for probably ten minutes now, trying to muster up the courage to go inside. No more being the same coward who told Lucy that he wasn't ready to say goodbye instead of confessing how he felt. No being George who never took a chance with Hedy because he never thought he stood a chance. No holding those three words in, under lock and key despite how much they clawed at his windpipe every single time he saw Lucy.

He takes a deep breath, steeling himself to knock when the door swings open to reveal Amy. The sudden irrational fear that she has a bottle of olive oil shoots through him. Wyatt stands there, frozen, his fist in an awkward half raised pose. Amy looks him up and down, unimpressed, raising her eyebrows. "I got tired of watching loitering outside my house like an idiot." She finally says. Wyatt can't disagree. Amy jerks her head in a _come in_ motion.

Wyatt follows her, apprehension curling like a wicked scythe in his gut. These next few minutes will either go well, or he's screwed. And Amy might beat the shit out of him again.

Amy leads him confidently into the kitchen, either not noticing or not caring about the nervous energy he's emanating like radio waves. She strides to a cabinet, grabs a bottle of Jack Daniel's and two tumblers. She brings the bundle to the table, pouring a generous amount into both tumblers and placing the bottle between them before throwing herself into a seat and indicating that he should do the same. When he's seated at the table, she slides one of the glasses over to him. "You look tightly wound today, thought you could use the drink." Amy states, already tipping the amber liquid back.

For what may be the first time in his life, Wyatt doesn't reach for the glass of whiskey. He wants zero alcohol in his system for what comes next.

Amy takes notice, sitting up straighter and depositing her glass on the table. "Okay, you have on 'serious soldier' face. What's up?" For someone usually so collected and nonchalant, at least when she stopped trying to kill him through blistering glares, a tremor of worry weaves itself into Amy's voice.

"I have something to ask you." Wyatt admits, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. His voice is unexpectedly calm, the surface of unmoving, undisturbed water. His trigger finger is twitching. Military training worked to eliminate the normal, civilian signs of anxiousness. Instead, his trigger finger curls involuntarily and he becomes stone-faced.

He can feel his face settling into that mask. He's been to plenty of war zones and been devasted in some way by all of them. But this moment, right here in front of this small woman, might just be more terrifying than all of them.

Well, the absolute, crushing terror of almost losing Lucy ranks above this.

By a slim margin.

"Okay, then, enough with the stoic face and just ask." Amy demands. If nothing else, you could tell Lucy and Amy were related by how bossy they were. "Does it by chance have anything to do with the box you have in your pocket right now?"

 _That_ throws him for a loop.

Or a lot of loops. So many that if he was on a roller coaster, he'd most likely be vomiting by now.

"It is, isn't it!" Amy exclaims, bouncing up and down in her chair like a small child. Her face is split wide into a smile, her hazel eyes full to bursting with delighted sunlight reflected through the window. "I knew it!" she squeals, her feet kicking out quickly. "Can I see it? Please, Wyatt?" she begs, leaning forward earnestly.

This is good right? She's not rearing up to punch him. Or throw him out. Or scream no in his face. Which is a good sign.

To honest, he's too flabbergasted to analyze Amy's reaction and what it means for him.

For the second time in a short amount of time, Wyatt's left staring stunned at Amy. She keeps leaning incrementally forward in her seat. So much that Wyatt's afraid she's going to faceplant pretty soon. Her eyes, wide and round, are glued to his pocket, reminding him of her request.

He clumsily sticks his hand into his jean pocket, fumbling with the tiny box before his sweaty palm finally closes around it. When his hand comes out holding the box, Amy lets loose another series of squeals.

Is that good?

"Let me see, let me see!" Amy crows, making grabby hands for the box. Wyatt jerks it out of reach protectively.

This box, and its contents, have the power to change Wyatt's life. It's a terrifying thought, that something so tiny, so easy to misplace can have this much power over him.

But shouldn't he be used to that by now? Lucy has nearly slipped through his fingers far too many times. He hopes that with this box, that will never happen again. He wants linked fingers, hand-in-hand, palm against palm. Not the fear inducing vision of her walking away from him in the shabby bunker hallway, taking everything bearable about that damn pit with her. Taking all the good parts of himself that she helped to shape since he met her, cracking his eyes open in that waiting room at Mason Industries.

Amy lifts her hands up in surrender and Wyatt carefully lowers the box back down. He gingerly sets it on the table between them, treating it with all the care of a loaded gun or a teetering vase. Carefully, he takes his hand and pries back the lid to reveal a simple silver band studded with a small, yet radiant, diamond.

Amy's hands hover in the air close to the ring, her face morphing to an awed expression. "She's going to love it." Amy whispers, breathless.

"Do you think she'll say yes?" Wyatt asks, uncertain. This is the most vulnerable he's been in front of the younger Preston. It's downright terrifying.

Amy gives him a _duh_ look. "Wyatt, my sister loves you. A lot. I don't quite get it, but…" Amy shrugs and Wyatt gives out a little snort at the barb mixed up in that statement. Amy grins wryly.

"The reason I'm here—" Wyatt pauses, the words like concrete under his tongue. "is to ask for your blessing." Choking the rest out.

That effectively stops Amy in her tracks. Her eyes leave the diamond to focus on him, her mouth dropping open in a way that's so completely Lucy that Wyatt has the sudden urge to laugh.

Time stretches with Amy looking at him in shock. This may be the first time Wyatt has ever stunned Amy speechless. He counts that as a win. As long as the next words out of her mouth is 'yes, you have my blessing'.

"Really?" Amy asks when she finally gets her jaw functioning normal again instead of hanging limply from her face. "You didn't exactly strike me as the sort of ask-for-a-blessing kind of guy." She remarks.

That scythe from earlier starts scratching his insides. "Is that a yes…?" Wyatt presses.

"You know I'm only her sister, right? You don't _need_ my blessing." Amy's sounds sincerely confused by the purpose of Wyatt's visit.

Okay, so just a few more steps before getting that blessing. Like explaining why it's so important. No big deal. "Amy," he starts, voice heavy and serious. "I know that I don't need your blessing, but you and Lucy are so close. And I know it would mean the world to her."

Amy's eyes widened at every word and now Wyatt's worried they're going to pop right out of her skull. He wishes she'd stop doing things that make him concerned about physical harm coming to her.

"You really love her, don't you?" Amy blurts. Wyatt's simultaneously confused and disappointed. That elusive _yes_ is still lingering in the land of unspoken and he'd thought they'd already determined that Wyatt loved Lucy.

His confusion must show on his face because Amy's whipping her head back and forth in the next minute. "I know that you love her." She clarifies. "But this, asking for my blessing… it goes above even fairytale level shit. Not like, 'hey, you fit the magical glass slipper, marry me' or 'once upon a dream'. Or even 'hey, we never expected to fall in love, but here we are and we both saved each other' like, actual love-connection fairytales like _Tangled._ You, Wyatt Logan, are full on love-of-my-life, soulmate in love with my older sister."

Wyatt doesn't even try to half-heartedly object. It's being back in that military vehicle with Rufus in 1918. Wyatt feeling lighter than air because Lucy's _alive_ and wanting nothing more in the world than for her to be in his arms again because the mere thought of another millisecond without her is his idea of the worst possible hell he could land himself in. Then Rufus is telling Wyatt to just admit that he's in love with Lucy. He couldn't admit it, not then, but it was impossible to deny. Denying it would be a lie and Wyatt knew that he was in love with Lucy Preston. Six torturous weeks without her give him the barest taste of what life without her was like and he never wanted to experience that again.

Now, Wyatt would willingly shout from the rooftops how completely in love with Lucy he is. So yes, he is 'full on love-of-my-life, soulmate' in love with his historian. "Yeah." Wyatt confirms quietly.

"Wyatt Logan," Amy announces, interrupting Wyatt's wandering thoughts of historical rambles and wild, brown hair, "I give you my blessing to ask my sister to marry you." She finishes, smile wide. Wyatt's smile blows up to match hers. It's the kind of smile that is the product of pure joy, the one he only discovered because of Lucy.

He's about to drop at Amy's feet and thank her profusely when the sound of a door opening wipes the smile right off his face. "Amy?" A voice calls, all too familiar. Too out of place for this time of day.

"What is she doing home?" Wyatt hisses at Amy, alarm surging through every inch of him.

"I don't know! Hide the ring!" she hisses right back, snapping the box shut and shoving it into his hands.

"Amy?" Lucy calls again, her voice closer this time. "I finally did it. I finally quit. No more Stanford!" she cries proudly as she walks into the kitchen. Wyatt just manages to stuff the ring box inside his pocket before she appears. "Wyatt?" she asks, brow crinkling adorably when she sees him. Her eyes catch sight of the whiskey, her frown deepening. "What are you doing here?"

Wyatt has no words. He feels exposed and conspicuous, as if it's painted across his forehead that he'd just asked Amy for her blessing. As if the ring left a visible outline on the kitchen table.

Luckily for him, Amy recovers much faster and replies in his stead. "Your boyfriend had a bit of a tough day and you were unavailable for a drink, so he went for the next best thing. Me!" she says brightly.

Lucy raises her eyebrows, not believing the story. Pale hands cross her chest as she stares them down and Wyatt guesses this the look she gives misbehaving college students. Not something he particularly likes being on the receiving end of. In this context.

"You quit?" Are the first words out of Wyatt's mouth once they click into place. It's also a subject change, something that doesn't slip Lucy's notice, but she goes along with it for now.

"Yeah." Lucy shrugs casually but Wyatt can detect the hints of pride folded into her body. "Decided to get out from under Mom's shadow and her department. The department that still wouldn't give me tenure."

"That's my Lucy!" Amy chirps, her pride shining so clearly through as she wraps Lucy up in a tight hug. Lucy's hands lock around her younger sister and Wyatt watches as she melts into the hug, savoring every moment. After having to live without someone, due to death or their existence being erased, you learn never to take them for granted. Like all of Rufus's quips and bad jokes. Even the whining. It's all precious, worthy of being treasured.

Content feather around Wyatt, brushing him with his delicate wings as he thinks that this is exactly the way it should be. Him and Lucy here and now, in the present. Lucy with Amy back and Wyatt just… there. There for Lucy in any and every way.

Amy's shout of "This calls for celebration!" shocks Wyatt back into the present. Amy dashes to the table, snatching up the tumbler that Wyatt didn't touch, and pushing it into Lucy's hand. He watches as Lucy smirks and gives a little shrug before tipping the amber liquid down her throat in one smooth motion. Amy cheers, taking the tumbler from Lucy. Presumably to refill it.

Lucy strides toward Wyatt, stopping with too much distance between them for Wyatt's liking. Hand meets shoulder as Lucy playfully gives Wyatt a push. He chuckles. "I know you two are up to something," Lucy informs him. "and I will find out what it is."

"Oh yeah?" Wyatt questions, his voice that kind of weightless that only Lucy can invoke.

"Yeah." She confirms, her voice dropping and eyes darkening. Her fingers slide into his belt loops, reeling him in closer until her curves are just tantalizing brushes against his body. His hands automatically go to her waist, sliding around to her back.

"What?" he whispers back, head tilted down and voice husky. "You're not going to go into detective mode right now?"

Lucy shakes her head, leaning in until he can see every molten gold fleck in her luminous eyes. "Tonight, we're celebrating." Her breath ghosts over his face.

"Is that right?" Wyatt murmurs, pressing a kiss behind her ear. Lucy's breath hitching makes Wyatt smile and then she's nodding against him, her hand on his face to bring her lips to his. His hands go under his thighs and with the barest touch Lucy's jumping up and wrapping her lithe legs around his waist as their tongues tangle.

In the background, somewhere through the haze of everything that is Lucy, he thinks he hears Amy groan at their blatant display in the kitchen. But with Lucy against him, he can't find it in himself to care all that much about anything else going in the rest of the world.

* * *

Wyatt doesn't have a plan.

He hasn't mapped out the perfect place to drop to a knee or the perfect words to say to ensure a yes. Words have never really been his strong suit. The proof is back in 1941 by a certain poolside: _not hideous._ Enough said.

The ring is a constant in his pocket, its weight growing more and more each day. He wants to slide that ring onto Lucy's finger so bad that he aches. Everything that comes from the ring, he wants it all. Wants it so bad. But he wants the perfect moment. Lucy deserves that.

But timing has never been this strong suit either. That bit of proof lay on a unforgiving bunker floor as he told a beaten, bruised, and devastated Lucy that he loved her for the first time.

Lucy and he had never been conventional, have they?

They're sitting on the couch, a bowl of popcorn discarded on the coffee table in front of them. _Weapon of Choice_ is playing on the screen and the busty actress who plays Lucy is fawning over Connery's James Bond. Lucy is sitting beside him, one of his shirts hanging off her lean frame, hair a rumpled mess, and face clean.

She giggling at the movie, at the cinematic version of herself draping themselves all over Bond. It's not the first time they've ever seen the movie, but for some reason, Lucy finds the inaccurate portrayal of their real-life adventure every amusing tonight. She's giggling uncontrollably, little chortles leaving her mouth at intervals with her head thrown back across the cushions.

He loves it. He loves her.

He loves hearing that wonderful sound leave her mouth. Happiness, contentment, joy, and frivolity. It's the best thing he's ever heard and she looks so, so beautiful with her face scrunched up in laughter right beside him.

So he just does it because she's beautiful and he loves her and suddenly he doesn't want to wait anymore.

He drops to a knee.

He can read the confusion at Lucy's face at first, the laughter still evident in her voice as she asks him if he's okay like he fell off the couch.

He reaches into his pocket and flounders for the ring box, praying that he doesn't botch this up too badly. "Lucy." He says her name to get her attention, the ring box now in plain sight. Lucy's eyes fall right to the object in his hand, and he opens the box to ring the ring inside "Lucy, I've never been the best with words, but…" he trails off as her face changes.

All traces of laughter and relaxation have left her body. She's stiff, eyes wide and hands clenched tightly around the end of the couch with white knuckles. The blood has drained from her face and there's a spark in her eye.

It's not a good spark. It's not Lucy sprouting history or laughing carelessly at the Bond movie that only exists because of them and time travel. It's not comfort or honey or silk. It's not the fondness of Lucy reminiscing about her lost little sister. It's not Lucy dolled up in century appropriate clothing, a timeless beauty suited for any year in the past.

The look in her eyes is one of ash and ruin. It's the fall of ancient Rome. It's everything Wyatt Logan is sure he rightly deserves. _No_ starts reverberating loudly in his skull before she's said anything, another voice in his head reprimanding him for ever thinking Lucy would want to marry him after all the times he'd hurt her.

His world narrows down to the woman in front of him. Everything around him becomes blurry, nonquantal. The forgotten bowl of popcorn. The still-playing TV. The skid of Amy's feet slapping the ground as she rushes into the room. The one remote sticking out of the couch cushion. All that matters is her.

Her mouth opens and closes but no words leave her lips. Only air.

Tears start creeping into Wyatt eyes and bile rises into his throat. This is it. Lucy has finally come to the realization of how unworthy of her he truly is. He wishes desperately to rewind, take the Lifeboat minutes backward to her intoxicating laugh. Just one more minute of having her, holding her.

Loving her.

He's not ready to lose her.

Staring up at Lucy, so obviously torn, he wants to say something. Take it all back. Put away the ring. But he finds himself unable to move.

Every second drags out longer than the last, so agonizingly slow. Lucy's mouth moves sometimes, as if to form words, but nothing coherent ever comes out. A few tears have leaked onto Wyatt's cheeks, leaden with the knowledge that Lucy's going to leave him.

Lucy's eyes follow a tear down his cheek and she shifts closer to the end of the couch. Her hand, shaking, reaches out to catch one of Wyatt's tears. With her touch—so soft, gentle, and compassionate,—Wyatt's barely holding himself together.

"Yes." She whispers, her eyes still on his tears. Yes? Is Wyatt hearing correctly? Did she say yes? Is he dreaming? "Yes." She whispers louder, eyes floating up to lock onto his. "Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!" her voice grows louder, more certain, with every yes. She repeats it as she slides onto her knees with Wyatt.

Wyatt's body goes boneless at her acceptance.

Yes.

She said yes.

He hasn't lost her.

Then she's right there, hands on both sides of his face, kissing away his tears with him still kneeling on the ground and holding the box with the sparkling diamond open.

"That's not quite how I thought it'd go." Amy grumbles from somewhere far, far away.

* * *

Wyatt proposed yesterday, and Lucy said yes.

The love of his life said yes.

But after a really long time, where he was convinced she would say no.

Ever since, he's wanted to ask her but he's been too afraid. He doesn't want to prod or push too much. Doesn't want to reopen any wounds that she's managed to stitch closed after so long.

They're lying in bed, at his place this time. She's cuddled up next to him wearing another one of his shirts and he's only in lounge pants. His arms are curled around her and he's trying not to hold her too tight. Especially after last night when all his doubts and insecurities about them came crashing back into him with all the force of a Mack Truck.

Darkness blankets both of them, well into the night. But Wyatt's too lost in his thoughts to sleep.

Lucy hums from between his arms and he feels more than sees her face tilting up at him. "Wyatt…" she mutters, voice drowsy. Guilt worms its way around the edges of his brain. Now he's keeping her awake. "I'm usually the one that's thinking really loud. What's wrong?"

Wyatt tightens his arms around her, grateful to whatever God might be up there that he's lucky enough to have ever had the opportunity to hold her. "Nothing." He murmurs, pressing a kiss into her hair. "Go back to sleep."

Lucy sighs. "Wyatt." Her voice is decidedly less sleepy. "Talk to me." She implores.

How can he deny her anything she wants?

He also if he lets this question fester, it's keeping growing until it explodes out of him one day. He made a vow to himself that he wouldn't hide what he was feeling, after telling Lucy too late that he loved her. That involved the good and bad things.

"Why did you hesitate so much when I asked if you wanted to marry me?" Wyatt's voice is a puff of air gilding down to Lucy's ears, afraid of the answer. At first Wyatt thinks that Lucy didn't hear him. She doesn't move in his arms and she doesn't speak. He opens his mouth again when she rolls away from him.

Right away, his arms feel empty and his being throbs painfully with the loss of contact. A click and then the faint light of lamp illuminates a slice of the room. Wyatt had put it there for Lucy, for her to read before bed or if she couldn't sleep.

The lamp gives him enough light to see Lucy next right to it, rumpled and now, because of him, wide awake. He doesn't get to drink her in long before she rolling back into his arms, looking up at him from her position. "I wasn't expecting it." She admits, and Wyatt searches her face for any vestiges of regret or remorse, any sign that she wants to back out. "I was just laughing and when I look down, you're down on a knee with a ring. It suddenly felt like too much, too fast. I got scared. Really scared. I mean…I never…" he watched her struggle to find the right words.

"Did it have anything to do with the fact that the word _wife_ has been known to keep us apart more than bring us together?" he suggests, a burst of self-loathing for everything he's done spearing his heart.

"Maybe." Lucy admits, a bit shyly. "It shouldn't have. Aren't I always the one saying we can't live in the past?"

"It's not that easy to let go of." Wyatt whispers. It took him six years and loads of heartbreak and denial in a hollow bunker to let go of Jessica. The Jessica he got back wasn't even his. A cruel joke by the universe. A carved-out version of the Texas girl he fell in love with.

"I know." Lucy acknowledged, her hand making it's way up his chest and curving over his heart. "I just… I did what I do. I thought about it too much, too hard. I put too much stock into the words 'wife' and 'marriage'. I don't even know why. There's no one else I can even imagine _wanting_ to marry. Every road I've taken since I've met you, every timeline I've found myself in — they've all led me back to you. I know that I love you, that I want to spend the rest of my life with you. But when you said the words—"

"I didn't actually say, 'Lucy, will you marry me'." Wyatt reminds her. "I didn't say much of anything."

Lucy laughs, an angelic sound like he startled it out of her. "I remember." She laughs again. "Okay, then, when you _implied_ the words… I froze. I thought about walking down the aisle in a wedding dress, moving into a big house with you… having children." She mumbles the last part, hardly intelligible. Wyatt hears it as if she shouted it.

They haven't talked about it together, but he's thought about it. Having kids with her. But now, with her saying yes to his proposal, it seems so much closer. The image of Lucy cradling a baby, rocking them back and forth, leaves him breathless.

"I started questioning everything, if this is what you really wanted—" Wyatt jolts at her words, looking down at her sharply. "I know, I know." She concedes, burying her face into his bare chest. "Basically," Lucy starts up again, voice half-muffled by his skin. "I freaked out big time. But I managed to say yes in the end, so I consider that an accomplishment."

Wyatt laughs, very glad that so did manage to that very crucial word at the end. "I want to marry you, Lucy." He reassures, placing another kiss into her hair. "I don't think I've ever wanted anything so much. I want it all. The white dress, the house, the children… if you do too?" the last part comes out sounding like a question.

Lucy nods forcefully against him before pulling away. Her eyes capture his, glistening with everything to come. "Yes, Wyatt. All of it. I want all of it."

Wyatt's not sure he'll ever know how he got here, to her. He's one sorry bastard, but's he's also the luckiest one alive if the woman in his arms is any indication.

"You know, I don't think we even have to plan an engagement party. Rufus will probably do that for us." Lucy snorts out a glorious laugh. Probably becuase she knows it's true.

"Yeah." She agrees. "He'll hang up 'congratulations' and 'finally' signs."

"i sure he'll have one that says, 'he's only been in love with her for a few centuries' or something about getting my head head out of my ass." Wyatt chuckles.

"That sounds like Rufus." Lucy agrees and he can feel her laughing against him. Affection fills up his chest, leaving no room for anything else.

"I love you, Lucy." Wyatt tells her as he crushes her to his chest and peppers her hair with kisses.

"I love you, Wyatt." Lucy says back, making Wyatt's heart swell. Those are words that still steal oxygen from his lungs, words that he can't quite believe he's hearing. They are words he'll never get tired of hearing and he sure as hell won't get tired of saying.

Soon enough, Lucy's breath evens out as she drifts off to sleep in his arms.

With the love of his life in his arms, his soon-to-be wife, he follows.

His dreams are full of a big house, Lucy, and a baby with dark hair and stunning blue eyes.

* * *

" **There's only one thing left here to say / Love's never too late" listening to this song as I finish up this chapter. What is it with me and this fic and really early mornings? I don't know.**

 **Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter. You got to see some Amy/Wyatt evolution a.k.a. Amy not trying to kill Wyatt. We also got see Lucy/Wyatt development. YAY!**

 **I hope I did them justice. The proposal was the hardest part for me and I hope that I did okay with it and that I did our beloved characters justice.**

 **Just one more epilogue, which I have to rush to finish before the deadline.**

 **NBC still hasn't renewed Timeless, and I'm a little more dead inside. But I still have faith. And I can always rewatch. Well, if my DVR didn't decided to malfunction and erase every. Single. Thing. On. It. Including season finales of other shows that I haven't seen yet. Urghh.**

 **Sorry, I'm rambling but in my defense, I am finishing up at 2:00 a.m. On that note, there might be more mistakes than usual. Sorry about that.**

 **Thanks for reading and please leave a review!**


	3. Chapter 3

**First off, I am so mad at a certain network, but I'm going to skip that rant for now. This fic was started before that news hit, so yeah…**

 **Anyway, this is the last chapter and it took a completely different turn than what I thought it would. More angsty for sure. But it's me, so I should have expected that. I'm kind of uncertain about this, explained more at the end so I apologize in advance if it's terrible.**

 **Also, thank you everyone who commented and favorited and followed. It means so much to me!**

 **Super early in the morning almost 2:00, so the grammar might be worse than normal. Sorry**

 **Anyway, please enjoy this last chapter for "Love's Never Too Late". (there might be a trigger down there somewhere, I'm not sure. It's something that's a sensitive topic and 100% traumatic for anyone who has ever experienced it. So just watch out?)**

 **Please leave me a review when you're done! They give me life.**

* * *

"Why am I nervous? I shouldn't be nervous, right?" Lucy asks, smoothing her shaking hands down her white dress and staring at her reflection.

"No." Amy assures, batting her hands away from her dress. "You could be wearing a trash bag and walking down a dirty kitchen as your aisle, but Wyatt would still look at you like you're his universe, like you're the only one in the world. He'd still want to marry you just as much." Lucy laughs, her hands steadying at the thought of Wyatt waiting out there for her. "But luckily for you, you're wearing a gorgeous wedding dress ready to walk down an actual aisle to exchange vows with your man." Amy's hands flutter up to Lucy's shoulders to give them a squeeze, her face reflected in the mirror. "Although I still don't know how you got to Wyatt before I did. I mean, broad-shouldered soldier with stunning blue eyes and dimples—"

"Amy!" Lucy exclaims incredulously, laughing.

"What, Luce? I'm not blind." Amy states and Lucy rolls her eyes good naturedly. "But he's basically my brother now, so from here on out, his attractiveness is off limits. Besides, I'm happy you found him. You two are actually really cute together." Amy smiles.

"Really?" Lucy asks, arching her eyebrows. "Did you come to this conclusion before or after trying to murder him?"

Amy huffs, her eyes rolling around exasperatedly in her skull. "Are you ever going to let that go?"

Lucy pretends to consider it for a moment. "Probably not."

"Well, maybe I'll commemorate that time of the year with a prank war between me and your soon-to-be husband."

"Oh God, no." Lucy sighs, leaning her head back against Amy's.

"Get off, Lucy. You'll mess up your hair." Amy gently shoves Lucy's head forward from its resting place on hers. A wicked smile slowly encompasses her face. "But yeah, I think my idea is a pretty good one." Lucy groans and lightly shakes her head, indicating that she doesn't agree. "I'm being serious though, Lucy. You guys are cute together. Once I got past being angry at Wyatt for breaking your heart."

Lucy's heart swells with absolute love for her little sister. The tiny body Lucy held at seven years old. The protector who was willing to go toe to toe with a Delta Force soldier for the sake of her older sister.

"There is one thing I'm still pissed about." Amy says. "The fact that I'm not the president of the Lucy and Wyatt fan club." It's the last thing Lucy expects her to say and she can't help it; she busts out laughing. "I'm serious!" Amy cries indignantly. "Rufus is president and Jiya is vice president. I've been deigned to secretary, Lucy. Secretary!" Lucy laughs even harder. "You're not taking this seriously. I'm family, I should have special concessions."

"That's called nepotism." Lucy manages through her giggles, bending at the waist.

She's happy. She's so, so happy.

It takes her back to twinkling stars, a serene pool, ruby lips, and a flowing gold and white gown. And Wyatt's blazing, cerulean eyes. Everything was still such a mess then; her mother, Rittenhouse, her legacy, the fact that they were holed up in that dank bunker for the foreseeable future.

But it all fell away with Wyatt's eyes, like they were the only two people in the entire world. Wyatt's eyes were intense, tender, breathtaking, and ringed with desire all at once. That night, she let it fill her up. She let her lungs expand for the first full-fledged breath she'd taken since she'd returned to her team. She felt whole and loved and bursting at seams with possibilities.

That magical night, Wyatt's eyes were saying one sentence to her, over and over again: _I love you._ It was hard for her to believe at the time, and especially harder after the Jessica-being-alive fiasco blew apart their relationship and tore Lucy's precious possibilities into shrapnel to rest alongside everything else she'd lost. She knows better now. She knows that Wyatt Logan has loved her far longer than she can ever fully comprehend.

Today feels like that life-changing night in 1941, and the afterglow of one perfect morning in her soldier's arms. The muscles in her cheeks are familiar with her ever present smile and her vocal chords reverberate with a constant laugh. Every beat of her heart pumps love and happiness through her veins, threaded with the dazzling last peek of sunlight over the horizon before dusk swallows it up.

But it's so much more than 1941 despite the lack of all the opulent glitz and glamour that Hollywood had to offer. Lucy doesn't just have Wyatt, or Rufus. Or Jiya, Denise, and Connor waiting back in the bunker. No.

Today she has Wyatt, the man she's going to marry and never let go of again. She has Rufus, her best friend whom she lost once but fought fate and time to bring back. She has Jiya, her nerdy friend who asked her, _what about what you want?_ She has Denise Christopher, gazing at her like a proud mother. She has Connor Mason, whose hands have pulled her from the Lifeboat's hatch onto solid ground more than once. She has Garcia Flynn, a rare and unexpected ally who is surprisingly easy to talk to.

She has Amy. Lucy has her little sister back. Her kickass, infuriating, protective sister.

And no more Rittenhouse.

Yes, Lucy still has too many scars to count from a time when she wondered how someone can take so much without collapsing on the ground and giving up; without being crushed under its weight; without being sucked into a blackhole of grief. She still has doubts and fears and remembers with stark clarity the face of the solider she killed in 1918 among other traumas wriggling under her skin. But she's happy. After everything, she deserves a little happiness and she's going to bask in it. Lucy will bathe in it, let it wash over her and feel it's velvety lightness against her skin.

"Amy." Lucy says suddenly, her laughter dying down. "Amy, I'm so happy." The force of it almost knocks her over. It fills her eyes with teary wonder.

"Good." Amy voice is suspiciously thick and a glance in the mirror confirms that Amy's eyes are sparkling with unshed tears as well. "I'm so happy for you, Lucy." Her hand trails down from Lucy's shoulder to her arm, elbow, wrist, and finally reaches her hand where Amy entwines their fingers. Silence surrounds the sisters for a moment, the air crackling with contentment and a feeling of such immense bliss that neither knew could exist before. After a beat, Amy pipes up as she swipes at her eyes. "But no tears, Luce. If you're going to cry, do it at the ceremony. Cry when the time comes for Wyatt's vows and he still can't competently express his love for you. Cry tears of shame."

Lucy laugh rings out once again. "Amy! Be kind. He's just not the best with words." She chastises.

"Yeah, I know. He got down on a knee and looked like a blubbering fish as he _didn't_ actually ask you to marry him." Amy deadpans.

"He got scared I was going to say no." Lucy scolds.

"Yeah, well Rufus and I have a bet going that Wyatt's going to flop on his vows as well. He just chokes up around you. But watch him prove him wrong and give the most exquisitely beautiful, tear-jerking vows." Amy's voice dips into consternation at the end and Lucy shakes her head with a smile still curling her lips. "But let's you out of here, Wyatt's probably vibrating apart right now waiting for you. Any longer and he might just bust this door down, slide the ring on your finger, and declare you two husband and wife himself." Lucy laughs because she can see him doing that, her beloved, reckless Wyatt.

Amy skips out of the room before Lucy, skirts flouncing and clutching a bouquet as she goes to take her place. Then it's Lucy turn.

She takes a deep breath before pushing open the doors, all alone to walk down the aisle. As she strides down the aisle, to a beaming and eager and handsome Wyatt, she would swear she feels the barest brush of cool air against her arm. Henry Wallace, her true father, here in spirit. It's fitting.

There's something else Lucy sees as she takes step after step toward her future. It's the thin yet unbreakable thread that ties her to Wyatt. After everything, Lucy can't say with true conviction that she believes in fate anymore. But fate or no fate, her and Wyatt are meant to be together.

They met under the most extreme and ridiculous of circumstances: time travel. A soldier and a teacher who never would have met overwise were thrown together to stop a terrorist from ripping apart history. Then they had to thwart a shadow organization, pressed closer and closer throughout the centuries. If even a silver of fate existed, or even if it didn't, it lead her to Wyatt Logan. He was at the end of every path she traveled, every door she opened, every storm she survived—everything.

Lucy follows that string, attached from her heart to Wyatt's and endlessly stretching any distance that might come between them. She follows that string down the aisle to marry Wyatt Logan in a small, intimate ceremony that couldn't be any more perfect simply because he's down there waiting for her. Like always.

They exchange vows and rings.

Lucy says, "I do".

Wyatt says, "I do… ma'am".

And they share a kiss filled so with love and passion overflowing from the beginning of time to the end of time that the world stops for just a second.

* * *

Things aren't perfect now that Rittenhouse is gone, and they're married. Things have never been perfect. There's always been hearts ripped open and aching for the people they've lost. Wounds so deep that they're still open years later. Shattered pieces laying on the floor and ground into dust so they can't ever be put back again.

But that's never been much of a problem for them. Their edges were jagged when they met, hairline fractures running along their souls. Somehow, someway, Lucy and Wyatt always had a way of making their ragged edges fit. Now is no different, even if they're a little more beaten down and broken. Even if they're different, changed from who they were before the Lifeboat, Garcia Flynn, and Rittenhouse warped their lives in irreversible ways.

But they're happy together. Lucy and Wyatt. Always catching each other. Even if they get cut on each other's sharp corners, they never let go.

Lucy's prone to descending into silent spells and it's hard for Wyatt to determine if it's simply contemplation, or awful, invasive memories that have wormed their way into their head. Sometimes, she withdraws reflexively from his touch almost as if she's forgotten who he is or that there's no barriers, metaphorical or physical, to keep them apart anymore.

Wyatt has a difficult time not keeping his gun tucked into the waistband of his pants at all times. His first instinct at loud noises is whipping out a gun or snatching a knife. He still struggles with pent up anger, tension, and memories. More than one wall has suffered the release of his emotions. Just like the chipped tile in the bunker bathroom.

Both of them suffer from nightmares.

But they refuse to allow the scars of the past to detract from their happiness. From the feeling ballooning in his chest as he stands with Lucy in front of their new house. From the expanding lightness in his body as he sees Lucy's office is more half-office, half-library. From the laughs that erupts from his lungs every time Lucy attempts to cook and it's somehow worse than the last time she tried. From the feeling nestled right next to his heart when he holds Lucy, the feeling right in that exact moment, he's home.

* * *

He feels her leaving the bed the next night, leaving his arms. He lays there, empty and void without her warmth burrowed into him. Patiently he stays there, waiting for her to come back.

She doesn't.

After a few moments, Wyatt rolls out of bed knowing that attempting to return to the land of sleep without Lucy is pointless. He treks down the steps bare-chested in search of his wife. It doesn't take him long to find her.

She's slumped back against the couch cushions, a half-unpacked life scattered around her. Furniture boxes still taped and bolted shut. Some of the room is out of the boxes and in random places around the room. Other parts are partially covered in bubble and plastic wrap. It's a mess for them to do with what they wish. To rearrange and make something beautiful out of. Just like they did with themselves.

It's dark but he can still see Lucy from the wavering moonlight filtering through their open windows. Her brown hair is a tangled halo around her head and her sunset copper eyes are staring unseeingly ahead. It's a bit like her face after getting back from 1918. Blank, destroyed, all the life sucked out. It's a face he knows well and wholly hates. He knows what's running through her head when he sees her like this.

He pads quietly over to her, crouching down in front of her. No acknowledgement. Gently, Wyatt puts his hands on her knees and whispers, "Hey."

Her eyes blink owlishly, adjusting back to the present moment instead of wherever she just was. "Wyatt?" she asks, voice small and confused. Almost like a child. "I didn't mean to wake you." She says after a few more moments, realization dawning slowly on her overactive brain.

"It's okay." Wyatt soothes, mouth quirked into a small smile. "I can't really sleep anymore without you there with me." He confesses. Lucy gives him the barest smile but it's enough. She'll be okay. Slowly, she starts leaning forward until her forehead is touching his, sharing the same breath. Her arms flutter onto his shoulders before linking behind his neck. Wyatt stays there, giving her the comfort of his presence and skin against hers, giving her his exhales and breathing shallowly so she can have more air.

Wyatt loses track of how long they stay here, eyes closed and hearts beating in sync. "Do you want to talk about it?" he questions, letting the dance over her eyelashes, cheekbones, and lips. He'll do anything he can to ease her pain.

"Can—" Lucy swallows. "can you just hold me?" It's a request he'll never deny.  
His nod is miniscule, but he knows she feels it. Lucy's arms start to slither back around to release him from her grip but before she can extricate herself completely, Wyatt tips his face up to press his lips tenderly against her forehead. Once he's out of her embrace, he heaves himself onto the couch, leaning against the armrest at the far end. Lucy lays horizontally, her head ending up in his lap. Gently, he starts massaging her scalp, running his hands through her unruly curls.

They stay that way as the night carries once, wrapped in silence and each other with the moon casting a silvery spotlight on them. Sometimes, it's these moments that Wyatt likes the best. The quiet ones where they don't need words because they won't do a damn thing. All they need is each other. Where he's the balm that soothes her aches and pains and lets her know that she's here and alive and loved.

"Wyatt." Lucy murmurs against him, so soft that if he wasn't so attuned to her voice, he wouldn't have heard. "Tell me something good."

"You." He says it simply and immediately. She's his good thing. His best thing. His sunsets and sunrises, his steady hand, his smile. His everything.

Lucy gives a strangled laugh, her voice choked like there's something lodged in her throat. Tears, trying to break the damn and flood her cheeks. "Something else." She insists, curling up tighter against him.

"Not sure I have anything else, babydoll." He admits. He can't think beyond her, doesn't want to.

"Please." Lucy begs, and he can hear how much she needs it.

Wyatt thinks long and hard. Not his father, that worthless sonofabitch doesn't deserve even Wyatt's wondering, glancing, half-a-second thoughts. Stories from deployment, even the good moments, hit a little too close to home for both of them and the war they waged not that long ago. Jessica… those memories feel poisoned, tainted from the Jessica of the previous timeline. The Jessica raised and conditioned by Rittenhouse. A loyal and proud member. Lucy's better at separating the two, his Jessica from the Jessica that tore a hole through them. She'd probably love to hear about a young, reckless, dumb-in-love Wyatt. But Wyatt's not so good at separating the two Jessica's, so he'll just pass on that for now. Maybe someday. That left one person.

"Remember me telling you about how much of a troublemaker I was as kid?" Wyatt asks.

"Yeah. Fifteen-year old Wyatt Logan, the bootlegger. Barred from prom for drinking on campus." Lucy croaks, nodding against his leg.

"Well, I'm gonna tell you about how Grandpa Sherwin tried keeping me out of trouble." Wyatt chuckles. He already feels Lucy relaxing against his leg at the mention of the only good man Wyatt had in his early years. Wyatt always wished that Grandpa Sherwin could meet Lucy, but it knocks into Wyatt now with all the force of an enraged bull. Wyatt knows that Grandpa Sherwin would adore Lucy. Take her sides in arguments, regale her with tales of Wyatt's misguided youth, impart wisdom on both of them even though they're not children anymore. "He'd trade me; staying out of trouble for a about his life, mainly his time in the army. I couldn't pull one over him either. He'd know if I snuck the smallest sip of my dad's whiskey and wouldn't tell me a damn thing. Let's just say that I, uh… didn't get too many of them. Didn't clean up my act until just a little bit before enlisting and then the Army straightened me out from there. But I got some. He wouldn't sugarcoat anything either, didn't paint war as black and white, good guys versus bad, a chessboard where you could see your enemy clear as day. I was more the one who romanticized it, growing up on Westerns where everything was clear cut. Grandpa Sherwin would always make sure that there was some short of life lesson in his stories, of course. It was Grandpa Sherwin's personal history. Guess that makes me a bit of history buff." He jokes. Blessedly, Lucy's answering laugh is not waterlogged with tears not yet fallen or layered with past agonies threatening to stain the future.

Wyatt keeps talking, re-telling some of his Grandpa's stories for Lucy. He keeps going and going, even when he feels sleep weighing down his eyelids and pressing down around his torso like a blanket. He keeps talking and talking until Lucy's asleep. Her measured breaths reach his ears and her body is curled tightly around him, muscles lax and mouth hanging open to inhale puffs of air.

Wyatt gazes down at her, bathed in the moonlight that's creeped further in the room since he found her in here. The soft light highlights her battle-hardened limbs, always lanky but newly minted to escape captors and hold her own against the organization that was supposed to be her legacy. It pools in the hollows of her cheeks that shrink day by day. It illuminates the slope of her nose, the lashes that flutter gently against her pale cheek, and her delicate collarbone. She's beautiful, a mix of historian and fighter and passion and everything else he loves. Here, cradled in his arms with her mind caressed by sleep, she could be a moon goddess. It probably wouldn't be too far of a stretch. Lucy's always seemed too good to be true.

It doesn't take Wyatt too long to follow her into sleep. The position is awkward—partly upright yet slouched, Lucy's bodyweight all on his thighs—but he doesn't care. A sore back tomorrow is worth a peacefully sleeping Lucy right now.

Besides, he can't sleep unless she's with him anymore. It might be a bad habit he's developing, but he'll take it over alcoholism—the cliff he was teetering on the edge of for years after Jessica's death. Now he has something more addictive than any numbing wine or whiskey: Lucy. He's been a Lucy Preston addict far longer than he cares to admit. First craving the voice that was always there to contradict his bullheaded ways and pulled him from the dust of Alamo; her presence that gave him comfort and purpose; her eyes, so deep and endless and, at first, incapable of hiding a single thing she was feeling; her skin, the familiar electricity they've just always had, a constant connection that sprung up one day and he soon found himself unable to live without; her lips, their first meeting sweet and soft and signifying everything that he'd once been too afraid to admit; her body, the pleasure etched in her face when he filled her and how he wanted to put that same ecstasy on her face every day.

Wyatt Logan's addiction to Lucy Preston is probably enough to fill more than one ocean. But for now, she's there with him. So he sleeps.

* * *

For Lucy and Wyatt, the engagement phase didn't last long. Too much time had already been wasted on dead wives, twisted family trees, and the entirety of the space-time continuum that sucked both of them back into it repeatedly (and screwed them over more than once).

Lucy, now free from Stanford, insisted on not getting another job until her and Wyatt settled down. She wanted to be present in every second of their new lives as officially husband and wife. Wyatt desired a more stable job, something that wouldn't throw him into a classified mission or dangerous deployment at the drop of a hat. He told himself it was because he wanted to spend more time with Lucy. It was true.

Half true.

He wanted to start a family with her and he wanted to be there. Being separated from Lucy would be hard enough. But separated from her and their metaphorical child? No. Just plain no.

He sat down with Agent Christopher to talk over options and now, Wyatt is the proud head of security at Mason Industries. It's a good fit, for everyone. After all, Connor Mason had a time machine _stolen_ from him. By a terrorist. In his own company. He thinks that enough to warrant trust issues with Mason's capabilities to keep ahold of his crazy ventures.

It works for both of them. Lucy fields offers from other colleges, tabling them until she's "ready" to get back to work. They unpack the house together, arranging and rearranging and building their life. It feels good. It takes a while, but they get their house all put together. There are empty spaces, alcoves, and rooms. Voids filled with the silent whispers and promises of little feet running around.

* * *

Wyatt is worried. Very worried. It's been about a month since they've organized and unpacked everything. Wyatt goes to work every day, overseeing security measures, interviewing potential security officers, and taking charge of training. He and Lucy have started to settle into a rhythm, wonderfully domestic.

But she still hasn't gone back to work. It's a very un-Lucy like thing to do. He knows that she loves teaching, it's why she studied so this timeline's history so hard; so she could get back to it. Wyatt tries to let it go, ignore it. He doesn't want to question her and make it seem like he's trying to pressure her into getting a job or anything like that. Maybe quitting Stanford hit her harder than she thought it would? Is there something else? Endless questions wriggle restlessly at the back of his mind, refusing to be silenced.

It's about a week later, a week of incredible refraining on Wyatt's part, before he gets his answer. They're standing at the sink, him washing dishes and her drying when she asks him a question out of the blue. "When do you think Rufus and Jiya are getting married?"

Wyatt blinks. "Uh… I think Jiya's trying to give Rufus ample time to get off his ass and ask her but she's getting impatient. My money's on Jiya asking him."

"Wyatt!" Lucy giggles, putting the plate she was drying down on the counter so she doesn't drop it.

"What?" Wyatt asks, face split in a magnificent smile at the luxurious sound leaving Lucy. "Come on, Lucy, you know it's true. Why are you asking?"

Suddenly, it's as if a switch has been flipped. Her face smooths over and she bites her lip, attempting to fake nonchalance. "No reason." She shrugs. "If it's soon, I didn't want to ruin their big announcement with mine, so…"

 _Big announcement?_ Is she trying to be cryptic, because Wyatt's failing to connect the dots. He's not passing Go, not collecting 200 dollars. Lucy keeps peeking at him nervous from under her eyelashes, gnawing on her lip frantically now and twisting her hands. Wyatt racks his brain but he's still not getting it. "And by that you mean…?"

"I'm pregnant, Wyatt." She blurts like she can't hold it in anymore.

Wyatt drops the glass he's holding, and he thinks he might have heard a crack when it hit the bottom of the sink, but he doesn't give a damn about kitchenware at the moment. Pregnant? They weren't using protection, but they weren't specifically trying either.

Another voice echoes in his head, one he had pined for for six years. That pregnancy had been a lie, a last-ditch effort to keep Wyatt ensnared in her net and the web of their marriage so she wouldn't be kicked out the bunker. That'd make it hard for her to complete her objective. A word that opened a yawning chasm between not just him and Lucy, but everyone the bunker.

This is different. It's _Lucy_ telling him she's pregnant with their baby. The woman he loves more than anything. It's a shock to his system, the Lifeboat turning his organs inside out as they blink out of the present. _He's going to be a dad?_

Wyatt has no idea how long he's been standing there, frozen. He thaws as he lets out a whoop, lifting Lucy off the ground and spinning her around, unbothered by the fact that his hands are still soapy and wet. He's laughing and crying at the same time and when he finally puts Lucy down, he can see that she is too. He presses his cheek to hers, letting their tears mingling and their laughs ripple through the others body. "We're having a baby." Wyatt whispers in awe. Lucy nods against him. Right here, right now is the happiest moment of Wyatt's life.

"And if you've been wondering about why I'm still technically unemployed, it's because I figured that landing a job still to request maternity leave wasn't the smartest idea." Lucy murmurs.

* * *

About two weeks after Lucy told Wyatt she was pregnant, Jiya and Rufus announced their engagement (and yes, Jiya was the one who popped the question). Lucy had wanted to keep the news between her and Wyatt for a little while, and now she felt stuck. She didn't want Jiya and Rufus to feel that Lucy was stepping on their moment with a pregnancy announcement.

However, pregnancy was not kind to Lucy's taste buds. Cravings hit her hard. There were some weird combinations of food and there were foods that she could no longer stomach. Not to mention the fact that alcohol was strictly off limits for roughly nine months. When Wyatt and Lucy went out with Jiya and Rufus, it was usually to eat, and sometimes to their favorite bar. Given that their friends were geniuses, it didn't take them long to pinpoint something off with Lucy.

Jiya came to the realization first, an engagement ring (that she and Rufus chose together after he said yes) refracting light on her finger as she scrutinized Lucy. Jiya's brow was furrowed, braid slung over her shoulder and Rufus's arm around her. It all changed in .2387 seconds. Olive hands smacked the table and Jiya squealed, very loudly in a very public location, "OH MY GOD! YOU'RE PREGNANT!"

The secret got out quickly after that. Denise was immediately imparting motherly wisdom on them, pushing parenting books into their hands, and watching closely over Lucy. Amy threw a bit of a temper tantrum that she wasn't the first to know and that they didn't tell her as soon as they knew.

Lucy is now in her 18th week. All visits to the doctor have indicated everything going smoothly, but Wyatt's wound extra tight at work these days. If he punches some of the recruits a little harder than normal during training, no one says anything. Lucy also finds his hovering in equal parts annoying and endearing. Depending on the day.

Lucy barely has a baby bump. It's tiny, but's it's already everything that Wyatt and Lucy revolve around. There's still so much more time to go. Wyatt has no idea how he's going to handle the later months with a heavily pregnant Lucy if he's this anxious at 18 weeks.

He never finds out.

He's in his office at Mason that day, filing security reports when it gets the call. The screen flashes Lucy at him and he answers at once. He doesn't think anything of it. Lucy's been inclined to call Wyatt at work and ask him to pick something up for her on the way home.

This time is different.

It's not Lucy at the other end of the phone.

"Wyatt?" Amy, voice saturated with panic.

"Amy?" All thoughts his job are abandoned. "Amy what's wrong? Lucy—"

"She—She—" Amy dissolves into sobs, ugly hiccups coming through the line. Wyatt's gripping the phone like it's his lifeline because he has nothing else to hold on to right now. He's starting to spiral. "My god, Wyatt. There's so much blood. Why is there so much blood?" Amy begs through the phone.

Wyatt's blood runs frigid. Amy never came out and said her name, but he knows that the blood Amy's referring to is his wife's. "Amy—"

"She was find one minute, and then the next she's saying her stomach hurts. Then she just starts bleeding. So much. I called the ambulance already, but Wyatt you need to get to the hospital." Wailing sirens come through the line.

"Amy, what's happening to her?" Wyatt gasps out, voice wobbling.

"Wyatt…" Amy whispers, voice laced with pity. "I think she's losing the baby."

He drops the phone.

Most things from that point is a blur. He knows he stumbles out of his office, off-kilter and face streaked with tears. Rufus and Jiya intercept him and then Wyatt's in the back of Rufus's car as Rufus guns it to the hospital. When they get there, his worst fears are confirmed.

Lucy had a miscarriage.

Lucy lost the baby.

* * *

"When's the last time you and Wyatt had sex?" Amy questions, crude and blunt as she makes herself at home in Lucy and Wyatt's living room. Lucy didn't hear her sister come in.

It's been two months since Lucy lost her baby. She's been in a daze ever since, the world hazy around her as gets by day-by-day. Her fingers are wrapped tightly around an entire bottle of whiskey, hella strong stuff, too. Wyatt's tried to help, but he's mourning too. He's at least attempted to pull himself out of it. He's taking care of himself and trying to take care of her too. He cleared all alcohol from the house the first night Lucy drank herself into oblivion. But Lucy has a car, a credit card, and knows the location of a grocery store, so she's winning that particular battle. She knows that she and Wyatt should be mourning together and she knows what his biggest fear is: that he'll lose her too. To grief and loss. It makes it her sick to think that she's doing nothing to contradict that mindset. But sometimes she can't even look at him. It wasn't his body that their baby's life slipped from. He wasn't carrying their child. Logically, she's aware that she's not at fault but her brain has gotten into the habit of informing her otherwise. The only way to shut up the goddamn voice is drinking it into submission.

"Protected or unprotected?" Lucy asks Amy, taking a swig of her bottle, the buzz humming through her veins.

"Does it matter? And stop that. That'll kill you and certainly won't help your next baby." Amy hisses, snatching the bottle from Lucy's grip.

"My next baby?" Lucy asks, turning to Amy incredulously. "I already felt one die inside me, that's more than enough for me."

"Lucy," Amy croons, voice much softer as she scoops Lucy's hands up in her own. "did you know that the next pregnancy after the first miscarriage is usually successful?" Tears start leaking from Lucy's eyes. Here they were, talking about her baby using words like _successful._ "And you are absolutely _not_ to blame for what happened." The tears are falling in earnest now, from both their eyes. Lucy wanders vaguely if her tears are whiskey. She'd certainly been drinking enough of it.

"I can't do it again, Amy. I'm so scared." Lucy confesses, breaking apart in her sister's arms. Lucy breaks and drowns and suffocates and burns down right there in Amy's arms.

"I know, Lucy. I know." Amy murmurs against her skin, her hands rubbing up and down Lucy's back. "But this has got to stop. This isn't healthy. Take care of yourself, take care of Wyatt. And mourn _together._ You're gonna get through this Lucy." Amy assures, her tears dampening Lucy's dark waves. "You're gonna get through this."

* * *

Lucy does get through it. With Wyatt.

It isn't easy, but when have they ever been easy? It's once more scar, bigger than all the others, to add to the museum of their cut-up bodies and hearts.

They mourn their lost child and this time, they can't hop in the Lifeboat and go back to change the timeline so their baby lives.

But Lucy wants to try again. She wants a baby that she'll hold and love and raise. But she'll never forget her first child and how they never got to draw their first breaths. Wyatt is there for her as always, constantly asking her if she's sure and they can wait if she wants.

She wants a baby. She wants to have a baby with Wyatt.

Although…. There is one thing she wants to clear up before trying.

Wyatt drives her to Mason, where they track down Mason, Agent Christopher. Jiya, and Rufus and herd them into a conference room. All their eyes are sympathetic, and Lucy appreciates the sentiment, but she doesn't want it. She just wants her questions answered. "Can time travel affect pregnancy? Or fertility? Or anything like that?" The question is mainly aimed at Connor, but she'll listen to anyone with an answer. Connor looks like he fully expected that question to fall from her lips.

"We don't know." He sighs. "There's so many variables, incalculable. How many trips you've taken, how far back, traveling to alternate timelines, injuries on jumps —changing the physical form from the initial jump back to the current timeline—" Connor keeps prattling on, listing off all the reasons they _can't be sure._

"So—so what you're saying it that Lucy's miscarriage could be the product of time travel?" Wyatt asks, voice strangled.

"It's impossible to tell. Or know." Connor admits. "I'm sorry."

Lucy feels sick, pressing her hand to her stomach. A habit she'd formed when their was still a little life growing there. "Oh my god." She breathes, staggering slightly. Wyatt's at her side in the blink of an eye, arms wrapped firmly around her to steady her. Even as the Earth's crust is crumbling beneath her feet.

"Or maybe it was a normal miscarriage." Denise cuts in. "You have no idea. But if you want children, you shouldn't stop trying because of some hypothetical, maybe time travel side effect nonsense." She insists.

"She's right." Jiya pipes up. "What we know about time travel and it's effects is alarmingly low for how much we've done it, but we can't let the what ifs dictate our lives."

* * *

Next year, Lucy and Wyatt welcome their daughter into the world.

One day, they're gazing down at their daughter sleeping in her crib, the tiny human they both helped make and love beyond words. "Lucy, I love you so much. I love _her_ so much. I'm so lucky. Why couldn't I have just found you earlier? Or not ruin us in the first place?" Wyatt whispers against Lucy's ear. So many emotions war in his chest. Gratefulness, happiness, overwhelming love. But also mingling around is regret and sadness.

"It doesn't matter." Lucy's breath ghosts over him in reply, turning her head to the side and nuzzling her nose into his cheek. "If there's one thing we know by now, it's that love's never too late." She tucks her face into his shoulder as they both soak up the bliss of the moment for just a little longer.

* * *

 **Okay, last really early morning for this fic cause it's over now.**

 **This took a** _ **really**_ **different direction from what I originally intended. Initially, I wasn't even going to have more chapters beyond the first, but I hope I did okay. And the whole baby thing in his chapter…not in my plans. I thought about cutting it out, but I thought it kind of fit and I wanted the sister moment with Amy cause I thought I needed a bit more Amy Preston here.**

 **I get uncomfortable writing this far into the character's hypothetical futures, I always feel like I start to deviate from who they are. I hope I didn't and that I did them justice. And you know what? Even if people hate it, I did something new and different and stepped outside of my comfort zone and should be proud of that at least. I'll just keep telling myself that.**

 **Anyway, I hope I did the characters justice and that you guys enjoy. Please leave a review to let me know what you think.**


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